Great ad for EA produced by my friend Cat

Just a quick post to show you the brilliant EA ad produced by Cat Reynolds (my friend) for Dutch agency Wieden + Kennedy.

Gobbledygook manifesto

I have been wanting to share this ppt with you for ages. But I've been in internet hell for a month i.e. no broadband since August 14. Anyway, all sorted now. And now I can share this great "manifesto" by David Meerman Scott. It's a must-read for anyone responsible for writing copy for marketing materials or PR. And a great addition to the plain English campaign.

David aims to ban words such as "best-of-breed", "solution driven" and "world-class" from our writing as they are absolute drivel and mean nothing. His advice is similar to the plain English campaigners in that he recommends that we use simple language to describe our products and services. Language that everyone understands. He also highly recommends that we start with our buyers, not our products, when writing copy to show that we understand what our customers need. Complete common sense.

David's recommendations are, as you would expect, short and compelling. Click here to read his manifesto.

Lost in relocation

Apologies for not writing any posts for a few weeks. We've moved house and we're having difficulties with the internet providers. Their customer service and technical assistance has been ridiculously poor. We are currently questioning whether we should continue to use them. And have been lambasting them through WOM (word of mouth).

It's a reminder that while WOM can be great for spreading the word and promoting your products and services, it can also cause lots of damage to your brand. It's incredibly important to protect your brand every step of the way through excellent customer service and quality communications.

p.s. thanks to all the followers on Facebook. There is an extremely great new application called Network Blogs, which allows you to link your blog to your Facebook page. You can find more info at www.networkedblogs.com.